Ice storm hit San Antonio and the lights stayed on

San Antonio got iced over on Jan. 17, 2018, but CPS Energy mostly managed to keep the power going. Keep clicking to see 11 facts and photos that explain how bad the ice storm was in San Antonio.

San Antonio got iced over on Jan. 17, 2018, but CPS Energy mostly managed to keep the power going. Keep clicking to see 11 facts and photos that explain how bad the ice storm was in San Antonio.

Photo: Tom Reel /San Antonio Express-News

Photo: Tom Reel /San Antonio Express-News

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San Antonio got iced over on Jan. 17, 2018, but CPS Energy mostly managed to keep the power going. Keep clicking to see 11 facts and photos that explain how bad the ice storm was in San Antonio.

San Antonio got iced over on Jan. 17, 2018, but CPS Energy mostly managed to keep the power going. Keep clicking to see 11 facts and photos that explain how bad the ice storm was in San Antonio.

Photo: Tom Reel /San Antonio Express-News

Ice storm hit San Antonio and the lights stayed on

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Living in San Antonio is wonderful in many, many ways. For example, we don’t often have to deal with harsh winter weather. In fact, many of us probably appreciated that we were not affected by the “bomb cyclone” that recently hit the Northeast. Instead, at that time we were enjoying temperatures in the 50s.

However, two weeks into 2018, Mother Nature reminded us that we aren’t immune from periods of bad weather. As ice covered Texas roadways, most of us had to huddle in our homes watching the bad weather roll into San Antonio. Interestingly, most of us never doubted that we could power and operate our heaters, stoves and televisions, activities all enabled by technology, planning and the extreme dedication of a 3,000-plus CPS Energy employees. Certainly, I wouldn’t have thought of it a decade ago, before I began serving on the board of our city-owned utility, CPS Energy.

Our city and economy could quite literally have been frozen until the weather changed. Everything from police and fire services to water and sewer services runs on electricity. Long outages endanger our economy and neighbors. As the storm progressed, electric service continued, as well as the remarkable responses from our city services. It was due in no small part to the millions of work hours that CPS Energy spent in preparation and execution.

In 2009, I began my service as a member of the CPS Energy board of trustees. Since that time, CPS Energy steadily invested in expanded infrastructure, better equipment, more training and new technologies. The benefits from these investments all blend together to help us keep the lights and heat on during periods of bad weather and under normal everyday conditions.

Until I began serving on the CPS Energy board, I never realized the complexity of our electric and gas business. I especially didn’t realize the complexity of their operations during intense storms. There are the logistics to ensure workers, vehicles and equipment are where they need to be. There are hundreds of call center employees, working day and night to talk to customers in their time of need. And there is continually solid coordination with the surrounding city and county governments to ensure everything is running smoothly.

Those are the things that can be readily seen. What can’t be seen is the effort to serve our everyday needs, plan for future economic growth and work to prevent outages in the first place by investing in technology. For example, CPS Energy utilized its AMI investments in this last storm to prevent or shorten the outages.

I began my service on the board with a commitment to help guide the company to continued success. Like Derrick Howard, whose term ends soon, I will spend this next year simultaneously serving out my final year and leading an effort to find my replacement. Then, when my term comes to an end next year, I know that my commitment to guide and support CPS Energy will have been accomplished.

I have seen so much progress in the past decade and I know there is more to come. I see the eagerness of the management team to adopt new technologies to better serve our community. I’m proud of the progressive leadership stand the company has on air quality, and I’m humbled by the compassion of the company to help its customers, including those in need.

These are benefits that arise from having an electric and gas utility owned by the city and run by people who live and work in our community. It’s a benefit that many electric and gas customers in other cities will never know.

That’s why we all choose to live in San Antonio. Whether it’s sheets of ice or the intense August sun, our lights will stay on because the people of CPS Energy are our neighbors and remain committed every day to keep “People First.”

Dr. Homer Guevara, Jr. is an economics and government professor at Northwest Vista College and a CPS Energy Board of Trustees, who represents the community’s southwest quadrant.